Mater Dei High Boys' Basketball Team Loses Star Player to...What?

Rumors are a'running through the hardwood floor of Mater Dei High School's gym, where sources tell the Weekly what the Los Angeles Times first reported last week: its boys' basketball team is losing senior forward Mario Soto, a team captain and member of a group of players that has won three state championships in a row.

No one is talking at this point, so all we can revel in is the fact that the school's legendary pedophile-protecting coach, Gary McKnight, is even more annoyed than his corpulent self usually is.

Quick refresher: McKnight's former assistant coach, Jeff Andrade, was pushed out by school administrators in the 1990s after molesting one teen too many. When the Weekly reported on McKnight's antics during the investigation, the coach threatened to sue us--so we reported on him more. It eventually emerged that McKnight allowed Andrade back on campus even after school administrators forbade him to--yet they let him keep his job, because winning means more to Mater Dei than protecting students from perverts and their enablers.

Gustavo Arellano is the editor of OC Weekly, author of the syndicated column "¡Ask a Mexican!", and Taco USA: How Mexican Food Conquered America. He started at the paper with an angry, fake letter to the editor and went from there—only in Anacrime!